


The Ravelled Sleeve of Care

by lavenderseaslug



Category: Doctor Who
Genre: Gen, best bros
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2011-06-08
Updated: 2011-06-08
Packaged: 2017-10-20 06:20:14
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,224
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/209679
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/lavenderseaslug/pseuds/lavenderseaslug
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>This is based on the premise that the Doctor has had bunk beds in the TARDIS for some time, and that he and Donna Noble used to stay up late and chat about things.</p>
            </blockquote>





	The Ravelled Sleeve of Care

“My second favorite household chore is ironing. My first being hitting my head on the top bunk bed until I faint.”   
\- Erma Bombeck

\- - -

Donna didn't think that she would be sleeping in a bunkbed - like some kind of kid - when she boarded the TARDIS that first night. She imagined spacious bedrooms and lavish baths and enough room to recreate the opening to _The Sound of Music_. But lo and behold, when she opened the door to her new bedroom, there was a bunkbed, where her things were stacked against the bedframe, waiting for her to settle in.

She was even more surprised when the Doctor came in ( _sans_ knock), wearing pinstripe pyjamas, no less, and launched himself up the ladder to the top bunk. Just as well - there was no way she was climbing up there in a nightshirt.

There was no nighttime conversation, just the gentle hum of the TARDIS and the quiet breaths from the Doctor above her. She couldn't quite believe she was in a time machine, traveling through space (though the Doctor was careful to note that he put it on autopilot during the night, with instructions not to land anywhere...weird). She almost didn't want to fall asleep, for fear that her dreams would never match up to the reality in which she was currently living.

\- - -

After a long, cold shower (Donna wasn't sure if she ever wanted to be warm again, not after crawling through a giant volcano and being near-covered in ash), she towel-dries her hair mindlessly as she gets ready for bed. Time Lords keep such strange hours; she was never sure when he was coming in, so she always left the light on. But her hand pauses on the switch as she hears a deep sigh from the upper bunk.

"Doctor?" she queries, her voice quiet. He'd had a hard day, she knew; perhaps he just wanted peace and quiet.

"Yeah," he answers, volunteering nothing, but not ignoring her. She places the towel over a rung of the ladder to dry, giving herself a reminder to move it before morning or no doubt the Doctor would slip and fall on it and then there'd be hell to pay. (He did not like being clumsy, and found any excuse to blame trips and falls on anything but himself).

"Good day today, after all," she says as she climbs under the covers. "Just think, Evelina will get to have friends instead of turning into a dusty old pile of rock. Won't that be nice?" She’s speaking half to herself and half to the man - well, alien - above her.

"And Quintus will live to drink another day," he replies, no malice in his voice. "And Metella and Caecilius will run a stone shop and everything is set right again. Except for those twenty thousand other people, left to die." The bitterness in his voice alarms her. 

She hears the sounds of the Doctor turning in bed and finds herself turning as well, lying on her side, staring at the wall, wishing there was a window - how marvelous it would be to look out into space, to fall asleep with Saturn's rings so close you could touch them.

"But think of the six billion people walking around now. Think of them," she says after a long pause. "Think of me. I wouldn't be here now if we hadn't done that. And what a conundrum that is - my head hurts just thinking about it." The Doctor let out a low chuckle, and Donna allows herself a small smile.

“You’re right, Donna Noble. You’re right.” She stares up at the bunk above her, worrying about the Doctor, worrying about herself. She was responsible - well, half-responsible - for the volcano. Her mind boggles at the idea. Here she was, her first adventure since unpacking her hatboxes and she’d already written herself into history. Donna Noble, who would ever have thought?

\- - -

“HE TURNED INTO AN OOD.” She hears a sigh from above, well aware that saying this every five minutes may have gotten irritating, but it wasn’t something you just got over. Well, maybe it was if you were an ancient Time Lord and had seen everything under the sun. But she was Donna Noble, and she hadn’t been anywhere except to Egypt for three weeks and no one turned into an alien there. 

“Karmic retribution in it’s basest form,” he answers, his tone tinged with annoyance but Donna can’t be bothered. The sight of a grown man transforming into an Ood was enough to put someone off linguini for the rest of their life. 

“You act like it’s so normal, _Doctor_ ,” she retorts as she pulls the covers snugly around her. She still felt cold from that planet. It was a nice change from fiery volcanoes, but still - one didn’t travel through time and space and expect to deal with winter weather.

“Well. What is normal, really? I mean, when you think about it.” She can hear him running a hand through his ridiculous hair. She wonders if all Time Lords came with overly stylized coiffures, or if it was something unique to this particular alien.

“What is normal is not turning into a giant bald...thing that carries its _brain_ in its _hands_.” She can’t believe she’s having this conversation, can’t believe that just a short time ago, all she was doing with her life was nothing, and now she’s here. 

“So turning into some other thing with its brain on the inside would be all right then, would it?” She wants to hit him, not so it’d bruise, but just so he’d know for sure how infuriating he was being. 

“Well, it’d be a sight better than turning into Andre Agassi with a headcold.” She turned over, wondering for the first time who washes the sheets, and imagining the Doctor might have created some kind of TARDIS chore chart, and wouldn’t she tell him what she thought about that in the morning.

\- - - 

“You miss her a bit, don’t you?” Donna asks, breaking the silence that has reigned in the bedroom since the Doctor arrived, casting about for some topic other than his daughter. “Martha Jones. She’s something, isn’t she?”

“Yeah. She is,” he answers quietly and Donna knows he’s thinking of how she’d changed, for better or for worse. Not for the first time, she wishes that she could give his hand a small squeeze, let him know she thought he was a good person - a good _thing_. She settles for sighing lightly and turning on her side, looking out the window the Doctor had somehow installed. She didn’t know how windows worked in the TARDIS, but knew that she loved looking out at the stars, feeling like she was a part of something amazing. She placed her fingertips on the glass, gently tracing the lines of imaginary constellations. 

“Everybody at home all right?” The Doctor’s voice startles her from her reverie. 

“As well as can be expected, yeah. Mum’s taken to walking everywhere - says she won’t get caught in some conspiracy to poison England again. Amazing how she keeps narrowly avoiding disaster - it’s like Adipose all over again.” Donna doesn’t want to think about Gramps, to think of his sad eyes as she left the house. She wonders if the Doctor would let an old man on one adventure, just so he could have something in his old age.

“And Wilf?” Donna should have known by now that she couldn’t keep anything from him, not really. 

“Oh, he’s fine. Expect he’s looking up at the stars right now.” Her voice breaks a little, she can’t help it. The Doctor’s head suddenly appears, upside down, his face showing concern, and Donna tries to smile, though she knows the attempt is weak. 

“Donna?” His voice is gentle and infinitely kind and she wants nothing more than to turn away from his understanding gaze, but she bravely looks at him. 

“I just miss him.” She knows that she should be relishing these adventures, enjoying every minute spent in the TARDIS, but she can’t help but miss the man she left behind, the only person who believed in her, besides the alien staring at her right now.

His hand drops down, dangling near her own and she reaches up, giving it a small squeeze. He smiles sheepishly and pulls his head back into his bunk, letting his hand dangle a little while longer, and Donna isn’t sure if the contact is for her or for him, but she doesn’t let go, not until she drifts off, her face towards the stars.

\- - -

It wasn’t until much later, days later, that the Doctor even mentioned Jenny. Donna danced around the issue, suggesting new planets and adventures to go on. “We could go to that cloud planet you’re always on about,” she’d say at night, her mind trying to recall every little world the Doctor had ever mentioned. “Or maybe it’s time to go see something go supernova. That’s exciting, isn’t it? We could always go back to the beginning of Earth.” She babbled and rambled through those days, knowing his silence wasn’t an insult, but not entirely sure what she could do.

Donna waited for the Doctor to talk about Jenny. She knew he wanted to, knew that he didn’t have the words just yet. So she let the days go by before saying, one night, “You know those flips Jenny did? Did she get that from your side of the family?” And the Doctor laughed. Not a full laugh, not a gleeful one, but a quick chuckle. “Gymnastics aren’t taught in Time Lord school, then?” She keeps joking, keeps things light, and he chuckles again, for longer this time.

“Nah, we just learned about history and all of time and space and boring things like that.” Donna is tempted to climb the ladder, just to look at his face, to give his hand the comforting squeeze she always thinks he needs.

“We spent a few weeks on gymnastics when I was a kid. I was rubbish at ‘em. Couldn’t keep my balance at all. The trampoline was good, though. I could’ve bounced on that for ages.” She remembers the skinned knees and the sore muscles, but she also remembers the joy of flying into the air and thinks it’s a little like traveling with the Doctor. 

“Jenny would have been great,” he says after a bit, and Donna’s heart breaks a little for him. “She would have been wonderful.” 

“Yeah,” Donna agrees, because she thinks it’s true and because she knows the Doctor needs to hear it. She reaches up her hand, gently skimming the bottom of the mattress above her and the Doctor’s hand finds hers with ease, like he was just waiting for her, and she feels gratified that, at least at this moment, she is doing something important, something that really matters. 

“Thank you, Donna Noble.” He says it so quietly she’s not entirely sure she didn’t just imagine it, but then he squeezes her fingers once more then drops her hand and she can hear the rustling of his sheets. 

“Thank you,” she murmurs back, not entirely sure what she’s thanking him for right at this moment, and thinks she might just be thanking him for everything. 

\- - -

Donna hasn’t been read aloud to since she was a small child and her granddad read her stories about aliens and magic. And yet she finds herself enjoying the sound of the Doctor’s quiet voice as he reads from _Murder on the Orient Express_. She knew she should have had something signed. Just think, she could be living in luxury. Well, she would have been living in luxury. Now she was living in a bunkbed on a time machine, but in her mind, that was sort of the same thing.

“‘...Five o'clock in the morning is an awkward time to board a train. There were still two hours before dawn. Conscious of an inadequate night's sleep, and of a delicate mission successfully accomplished, M. Poirot curled up in a corner and fell asleep...’” Donna drifted in and out, not paying attention to all the words, but enjoying the Doctor’s attempts at mimicking accents, his occasional interjections lauding Agatha’s brilliance, his sheer love of this woman’s prose. 

“Doctor?” she asks, breaking into his narration and she hears him close the book. “She’ll be all right, won’t she? I mean. I know she’s written all these books and she remarries, but. She’ll be all right?”

“I rather think she will be, yeah. Just needs some time for the furor surrounding her disappearance to abate and then things will just go right back to normal and she’ll take credit for all your brilliant ideas.” She can hear the smile in his voice.

“Do you think she would have come up with them if I’d never said anything? But then if I didn’t say anything, and she had never written them, I wouldn’t know anything about them. Oh, all this time travel stuff makes my head hurt.” She drums her fingers mindlessly on her abdomen. 

He’s opened the book again, and Donna can hear that he’s beginning to get distracted.  
“I think, at this time, I would like the honor to retire from this case.”   
  
“What does that mean?”

“It means I don’t want to talk about the intricacies of time travel.” She feels a little hurt by his words but then he adds, “But you made your mark, Donna Noble, on the annals of history. Who knows, maybe you did plant the seed in her head. But even if you didn’t, it doesn’t matter. You still saved her life tonight, and without her, I wouldn’t be able to read this very engaging bedtime story out loud to you.”

“Yeah, yeah, get on with it, then,” she says rudely, though she’s smiling. She stares out her window as the Doctor begins reading again, and she thinks of the woman they left behind, with no memories. Imagine, not being able to remember something as exciting as a giant wasp and the Doctor, and everything that happened. Imagine just going back to your normal life, as though nothing extraordinary had ever happened. She shivers a little, though she’s not cold, and closes her eyes, letting the Doctor’s voice lull her to sleep.

\- - -

They don’t talk much, when they get back from the library. Donna makes a joke about spoilers, but it falls flat and she goes to take a shower, even though in her mind she can believe she just showered that morning. Back when she had a husband and a family, and _something_.   


When she gets into the bedroom, she can see the Doctor’s already there, and Donna knows he’s thinking about River. River Song. An anomaly, just like him. Another time traveler, and one who knew everything about him. 

Everything except who she, Donna Noble, was. The thought gives Donna chills. Where is she, in the Doctor’s future? She turns off the light, cloaking the room in darkness, knowing they both are pretending to be all right, if only for the other one’s sake. 

“She’s all right?” Donna asks, not quite sure if she should say River’s name.

“She’s all right. She’s with her friends. She’s not alone.” And Donna can hear in his voice just how alone he feels and thinks she might be able to sympathize, at least a little.

“You saved her. And not like that computer saved her, but really saved her. She gets to go on, forever. And all those people...” She trails off. All those people. She feels like she knows them, at least a little. She could have met more of them. She thinks of the man who is not her husband, of the children she did not bear. “Why doesn’t she know who I am?” Donna asks, unable to keep the question inside and the worry from her voice.

The Doctor doesn’t answer and Donna feels fluttery inside. “What happens to me?” she asks again. “Where am I in the future?” Her voice becomes demanding, her tone fierce. She wants to know what would make her leave this life, because there is nothing that would pry her away willingly. 

“I don’t know,” he says quietly. “I don’t know where you are. I don’t know what happens to you.” His voice is threaded with steel and Donna can tell he’s trying to stay calm, that he’s just as worried about her as she is. 

“You don’t make me leave, do you?” She voices the worry that is plaguing her most of all - that he won’t want her anymore, that he finds someone new and better than her. 

He turns to face her, his hair mussed from the pillow. “Donna, I would never. You are the best - the best friend I could ask for.” He holds her gaze, her eyes watering, her hands shaking. “I don’t know where you are in my future, but no matter what you’re doing, you’re sure to be just brilliant and you probably won’t miss me one bit.”

She’s crying now, the tears spilling out and she can’t even pretend she’s not. “I never want to leave you,” she gasps out, “or the TARDIS.” All of a sudden, the Doctor has climbed down the ladder and has his arms around her and she’s hugging him back like it’s instinct and she can feel his pyjamas getting wet, but he’s just holding her like nothing matters.

“I’m sure you stay as long as you can,” he whispers into her hair, and she knows that he’s just as worried about losing her as she is about leaving him.

\- - -

“You all right?” Donna asks as the Doctor vaults himself into his bunk. 

“Oh, yeah, don’t worry about me.” He sounds fine, sounds so normal. Donna thinks of him silenced, unable to say anything and her heart breaks a little for him. 

“Well, I’ll worry all the same, thank you very much,” she tells him, climbing under the covers and turning to look out the window at the planet they’ve left behind. A day of spas and warm baths was well and good, but she’s relieved to be back on the TARDIS, with her Doctor, safe and sound. 

“We’ll have to go and see the sapphire waterfall another time. And that anti-gravity restaurant. I bet it’s wild.” Her voice is overly loud, she knows, but she just can’t bear quiet right now, can’t bear to think of the TARDIS as a place without sound. 

“We will, yeah.” He’s not really paying attention to what she’s saying, but she’s just comforted by his words, even if he’s not saying anything of note.

“I mean. It sounded great. The giant cliffs and all the diamonds. Not like a school trip at all.” It’s true, she never went on a trip to any place half as exciting. They once went to the British Museum, but she had to wait on the bus after she kicked a security for telling her she was standing too close to King Tut’s tomb, like she was going to touch it or something. 

“It’s really lovely. You would love it.” His mindless answers eat at her a little, but in the end, at least he’s answering her at all.

“Someday,” she says, because she never wants to think about how that word will eventually be meaningless and they’ll be out of adventures and out of time, and she’ll be somewhere else. She believes in possibility and the ever-changing nature of time, but she can’t quite believe that River Song would be mistaken.

The Doctor’s sheets rustle and Donna is at a loss for words. She’s never thought of the Doctor as powerless, but she thinks that’s how he feels. 

“Donna?” he asks, and she lets herself smile because he’s said her name and he’s talking and that’s all she wants right now.

“Yeah?” she answers, staring up at the bottom of his bunk.

“Thanks,” is all he says, and it means everything and nothing all at once. His hand drops down and hers automatically goes to it, their ritual any time anything gets to be too much. It seems they’re doing it more and more these days. 

Donna squeezes, just once, then lets her hand fall. The Doctor’s hand lingers a bit before he pulls his arm back under his sheets. 

“Goodnight,” he mutters, and she savors his words, because she can’t imagine him without a voice.

\- - -

Donna feels restless, like she’s missed something, like something important and wholly unforgettable has happened, and yet she’s forgotten it. She thinks of the giant bug, dead on the floor. And of the woman, asking what she would be, telling her she was strong.

She can’t remember anything else, everything’s slipped away. She’s in the bedroom, alone. The Doctor stayed with the controls, his head in his hands, and Donna knows he’s thinking of Rose. She can’t begin to think what he’s feeling - it’s the end of the universe, and his long lost love is perhaps not so lost, and she’s just sitting here, useless, unable to remember the simplest thing.

The door creaks open and the Doctor slips in, thin as a rail, letting only the smallest shaft of light in. “You all right?” he asks, and she knows that he’s just asking to let her know he cares.

“Yeah. You?” She’s asking him for the same reason. Neither of them are all right, not at the moment, and maybe not for a while.

“Me? Fine.” He’s lying and they both know it and Donna turns away from him, looking out her window, imagining the stars blinking out. The end of the universe. She hears the Doctor climb into bed, hears him settle under his comforter, hears the quiet sounds of his breathing mixing with the hum of the TARDIS and she can almost convince herself it’s just like the first night on board. 

“Something’s coming, isn’t it?” she says, her fingers on the window, blocking out the stars she will never see, the planets she will never visit. 

“It always is,” he answers. “You and me against everything else.” He says it like fact, like they’ll be together forever, traveling in the TARDIS, like he’s forgotten that she’ll be gone someday and she can’t bear to think of him alone.

She can’t bear to think of herself alone.

“You and me,” she murmurs and she tries not to let her voice break. “We’ll get ‘em in the end, Doctor,” she adds, a lame attempt to lighten the mood. 

“We always do, Donna Noble. Brilliant Donna Noble. Brave Donna Noble.” Tears rise to her eyes.

“Stop it, Doctor. You always talk such nonsense at bedtime.” She turns her face into the pillow and when she finally looks up again, the Doctor is looking at her carefully.

“You really don’t know, do you?” he asks gently and she can’t quite bear this either.

“I don’t know anything,” she answers honestly, never more sure of anything in her entire life.

“Donna Noble. Infuriating Donna Noble. Irksome Donna Noble. _Important_ Donna Noble.” His eyes are so full of love that she thinks it might break her. She has never loved anyone quite as much as she loves him, and she fears her heart just isn’t big enough.

“It’s too late for this, Doctor,” she says, and turns away from him again, though she doesn’t hear him move for some time. She worries about the blood rushing to his head and is just about to open her mouth to tell him when his sheets rustle and his slow, steady breathing is the only noise from above.

“Good night,” she whispers, feeling something ominous, wishing she had something better, more meaningful to say. “Sleep tight.”

“Don’t let the bed bugs bite,” he murmurs back, half asleep, and she closes her eyes with a smile on her face.

\- - -

Donna awoke, lying in her bedroom, still in her clothes. She felt out of place, like something wasn't right, like she hadn't used this bed in a long time. But that wasn't right, she slept here just last night, after staying out too late and drinking too much. She looked at the crease left by her head in the pillow, and for a brief moment thought she'd rather sleep in a bunkbed - something safe and secure about that - but shook the thought away. Imagine, sleeping in her clothes like a freaking kid and wishing for bunk beds. Mental.

She looked around, feeling suddenly sad and very much alone. Her phone buzzed in her hand, shaking her from the ennui that had settled around her shoulders. “Traveling through space? They’re having me on. It’s like that Titanic story all over again.” Her phone buzzed again and again, more messages from her friends. “One big plot to make me look a fool,” she muttered, looking around her bedroom again, trying understand why this place felt so foreign to her. She could almost remember something, just a moment - a gentle hum and soft conversation, but then her head started to hurt - she really must have had too much last night. Gently touching her throbbing temple, Donna gave one last look at her bed. “Bunkbeds. Ridiculous,” she said to the empty room, and closed the door, trying to leave the loneliness behind her.

  



End file.
